(_HOPE FOR SCOTLAND--SELF-SUBMISSION--CHRIST HIMSELF IS SOUGHT FOR BY
FAITH--STABILITY OF SALVATION--HIS WAYS._)
WORTHY SIR,--Grace, mercy, and peace be to you. I long for the time
when I shall see the beauty of the Lord in His house; and would be as
glad of it as of any sight on earth, to see the halt, the blind, and
the lame, come back to Zion with supplications (Jer. xxxi. 8, 9),
"Going and weeping, and seeking the Lord; asking the way to Zion, with
their faces thitherward" (Jer. l. 4, 5); and to see the Woman
travailing in birth, delivered of the man-child of a blessed
reformation. If this land were humbled, I would look that our skies
should clear, and our day dawn again; and ye should then bless Christ,
who is content to save your travel, and to give Himself to you, in
pure ordinances, on this side of the sea. I know the mercy of Christ
is engaged by promise to Scotland, notwithstanding He bring wrath, as
I fear He will, upon this land.
I am waiting on for enlargement, and half content that my faith bow,
if Christ, while He bow it, keep it unbroken; for who goeth through a
fire without a mark or a scald? I see the Lord making use of this
fire, to scour His vessels from their rust. Oh that my will were
silent, and "as a child weaned from the breasts"! (Ps. cxxxi.). But,
alas! who hath a heart that will give Christ the last word in flyting,
and will hear and not speak again? Oh! contestations and quarrelous
replies (as a soon-saddled spirit, "I do well to be angry, even to the
death") (Jonah iv. 9) smell of the stink of strong corruption. O
blessed soul, that could sacrifice his will, and go to heaven, having
lost his will and made resignation of it to Christ! I would seek no
more than that Christ were absolute King over my will, and that my
will were a sufferer in all crosses, without meeting Christ with such
a word, "Why is it thus?" I wish still, that my love had but leave to
stand beside beautiful Jesus, and to get the mercy of looking to Him,
and burning for Him, suppose that possession of Him were suspended,
and fristed till my Lord fold together the leaves and two sides of the
little shepherds' tents of clay. Oh, what pain is in longing for
Christ, under an over-clouded and eclipsed assurance! What is harder
than to burn and dwine with longing and deaths of love, and then to
have blanks and uninked paper for[307] assurance of Christ in real
fruition or possession? Oh how sweet were one line, or half a letter,
of a written assurance under Christ's own hand! But this is our
exercise daily, that guiltiness shall overmist and darken assurance.
It is a miracle to believe; but, for a sinner to believe, is two
miracles. But oh, what obligations of love are we under to Christ, who
beareth with our wild apprehensions, in suffering them to nickname
sweet Jesus, and to put a lie upon His good name! If He had not been
God, and if long-suffering in Christ were not like Christ Himself, we
should long ago have broken Christ's mercies in two pieces, and put an
iron bar on our salvation, that mercy should not have been able to
break or overleap. But long-suffering in God is God Himself; and that
is our salvation; and the stability of our heaven is in God. He knew
who said, "Christ in you the hope of glory" (Col. i. 27) (for our
hope, and the bottom and pillars of it, is Christ-God!), that sinners
are anchor-fast, and made stable in God. So that if God do not change
(which is impossible), then my hope shall not fluctuate. Oh, sweet
stability of sure-bottomed salvation! Who could win heaven, if this
were not so? and who could be saved, if God were not God, and if He
were not such a God as He is? Oh, God be thanked that our salvation is
coasted, and landed, and shored upon Christ, who is Master of winds
and storms! And what sea-winds can blow the coast or the land out of
its place? Bulwarks are often casten down, but coasts are not removed:
but suppose that were or might be, yet God cannot reel nor remove. Oh
that we go from this strong and immoveable Lord, and that we loosen
ourselves (if it were in our power) from Him! Alas! our green and
young love hath not taken with Christ, being unacquainted with Him. He
is such a wide, and broad, and deep, and high, and surpassing
sweetness, that our love is too little for Him. But oh, if our love,
little as it is, could take band with His great and huge sweetness,
and transcendent excellency! Oh, thrice blessed, and eternally
blessed are they, who are out of themselves, and above themselves,
that they may be in love united to Him!
[307] _For_; _i.e._ instead of.
I am often rolling up and down the thoughts of my faint and sick
desires of expressing Christ's glory before His people. But I see not
through the throng of impediments, and cannot find eyes to look
higher; and so I put many things in Christ's way to hinder Him, that I
know He would but laugh at, and with one stride set His foot over them
all. I know not if my Lord will bring me to His sanctuary or not; but
I know that He hath the placing of me, either within or without the
house, and that nothing will be done without Him. But I am often
thinking and saying within myself, that my days flee away, and I see
no good, neither yet Christ's work thriving; and it is like that the
grave shall prevent[308] the answer of my desires of saving souls as I
would. But, alas! I cannot make right work of His ways; I neither
spell nor read my Lord's providence aright. My thoughts go away that I
fear they meet not God; for it is likely that God will not come the
way of my thoughts. And I cannot be taught to crucify to Him my wisdom
and desires, and to make Him King over my thoughts; for I would have a
princedom over my thoughts, and would boldly and blindly prescribe to
God, and guide myself in a way of my own making. But I hold my peace
here; let Him do His will.
Grace, grace be with you.
Yours, in his sweetest Lord and Master,